During home construction, railings are usually provided along stair treads, landings, balconies and the like. One end of the railing is typically secured to a wall while the other end is secured to a newel post, which is usually located away from a wall and anchored primarily only at its lower end. Because such newel posts are pulled and pushed during use, they can become loose and must be properly installed and secured. In the past, the installation of such newel posts has been time-consuming and costly because special skills and tools and additional finishing work was required. Additional bracing or reinforcement also was sometimes required, depending upon the particular installation.
Various fastening systems incorporating plates, braces and screws have been available for this purpose. For example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,295,638 and 4,367,864 to Eldeen, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,587,788 to Bielichi are representative of the prior art in this regard. These devices offer some improvement in installation time, but are still overly complicated and suffer from various other limitations.
A need has thus arisen for a new and improved method and apparatus for installing newel posts, which is quicker, requires no special tools and provides a more secure mounting which is also more aesthetic at the same time.